China based Giant Cloud storage service '360' dies!

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by cfrizz

If you are careless enough to leave your documents in the cloud, when the cloud disappears taking your docs with it, that's what you get for taking the easy/cheap way out.

On the other hand, burglaries occur and houses burn down. There's a risk either way.

For my eBook library at least, I do both. I have a back-up external hard drive and since eBook files are relatively small, I also back my entire library up to Google Drive.

[Josieb1]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

On the other hand, burglaries occur and houses burn down. There's a risk either way.

For my eBook library at least, I do both. I have a back-up external hard drive and since eBook files are relatively small, I also back my entire library up to Google Drive.

That's why I do both too, and why I pay for Dropbox. All our photos are there. Plus Calibre of course.

[Blossom]

I use Dropbox. It's the only cloud service compatible with many devices. On the Kobo it's a pain to use but it works for now. I'm 95% full though on my free 18GB.

I say stick with cloud services that are well established. I don't trust OneDrive even though I have 1TB with mine. Microsoft has made too many changes over the past couple of years. Removing free storage and changing plan prices several times. I don't trust Amazon drive either. It's done the same.

Dropbox and SugarSync have been pretty consistent for years. I trust them.

Sent from my XT1528

[Josieb1]

Originally Posted by Blossom

I use Dropbox. It's the only cloud service compatible with many devices. On the Kobo it's a pain to use but it works for now. I'm 95% full though on my free 18GB.

I say stick with cloud services that are well established. I don't trust OneDrive even though I have 1TB with mine. Microsoft has made too many changes over the past couple of years. Removing free storage and changing plan prices several times. I don't trust Amazon drive either. It's done the same.

Dropbox and SugarSync have been pretty consistent for years. I trust them.

Sent from my XT1528

I hope we can afford to keep both Dropbox and office 365 for two devices. I'm very loathe to move over to Onedrive and tbh I'd be more inclined to lose Word and excel on my MAC if hubby can find an alternative to Outlook for his W7 PC.

[drjd]

Having suffered with data loss many times due to failed hard drives, SD Cards, compact disks and a fire accident in my office few years back, it always becomes a scary thought for me to lose my data in my local storage. That made me to keep multiple backups every time at different places. With the advent of cloud services, I found it a more convenient method of backing up my data. Although using the cloud storage service is just a psychological assurance, IMHO, of thinking 'Someone else can take care of my stuff better than me'. It is just like billionaires keeping their money in Swiss banks and paying money to secure it . But, simultaneously, we have seen many reputed banks failing at times and so are the cloud space providers, so nothing is impossible in this world.

I used the services of Google Drive to backup my books, Dropbox for my documents and Flickr (1TB) for my photos and videos. When the '360' was introduced, I very doubtfully joined its lucrative offer for 36TB free, after having a careful research about the Chinese company's profile and their other activities.

This venture was promoted by Qihoo 360 Technology Co. Ltd., a Chinese internet security company known for its antivirus software (360 Safeguard, 360 Mobile Safe), Web Browser (360 Browsers), and Mobile Application Store (360 Mobile Assistant). It was founded in June 2005. Qihoo 360 had 496 million users for its Internet Security products and 641 million users for its Mobile Antivirus products as of June 2014. Qihoo 360's main revenue sources include advertising space on 360 Startup Page, as well as revenue sharing with independent games developers which have published their games on the 360 Mobile Assistant. The revenue breakdown in 2012 was split between the revenue streams as follows: 67% from advertising, 31% from internet value added services and less than 1% from selling third party software. The revenues increased by 96.0% from $167.9 million in 2011 to $329.0 million in 2012. As of January 2014, the market cap was $11.42B.

Therefore it seemed to be a fairly reliable host to me, and after having used their cloud services and software for few months, I found it fairly convenient and easy interface (despite all menus in Chinese only, and I don't understand a single word! ) to keep a second backup of all my stuff at a single cloud with a massive storage at my disposal. The total data I stored there is more than 2.5 TB so far. As I do not share my data with any other guys, it was okay for me to visit a single host and manage all my data with a simple user-friendly GUI. I have used this cloud for more than 6 years now.

With the unwarranted backfire of '360', now I may have to buy some other cloud space very soon, and transfer my data. I still can not digest the reasons they have declared to stop their services in such a hurry.

Originally Posted by Hamlet53

Yes, a service controlled by the Chinese government would strike me as a very leaky vessel to store ones information in.

That would be like wearing a shirt with a bullseye on the front and back and the words "Shoot me here." The only place dumber to use would be a cloud service run by Putin and his oligarch buddies!

Personally I don't view any cloud as safe for storage of anything I own. I only use a cloud to store info I want to sync between devices, and I'm very careful that none of that info is a security risk. If I want to transfer a file from one device to another I either do so via cable connections are occasionally I temporarily place a file on my personal website to be able to transfer it, but I don't do the latter very often.

[leebase]

Originally Posted by Josieb1

That's the decision we need to make next year. How do you find Onedrive compared to Dropbox. We have iPads, iPhones, a Mac, Windows PCs and an Android tablet. I'm just dubious of moving everything to Onedrive.

Start with the free version of Onedrive and see how you like it. For my needs, everything I used Dropbox for, I can use Onedrive for. I still have my free dropbox and some iOS apps that use it to sync. Haven't felt the need to see if I could move them over to one drive.

Dropbox syncs everything by default. OneDrive you have to set up a folder(s) to sync. Once I learned the difference, it was no problem. It's actually nice to be able to put stuff on OneDrive that does NOT sync to every other computer I have. You can probably do that with Dropbox too, but I never tried.

My kids LOVED me giving them "real Office" instead of insisting the free Open Office was "just the same" (it's not).

I like Office365 shared doc editing much more than google docs

[leebase]

Originally Posted by cfrizz

Clouds move, shift and disappear, whether in the sky or on the Web. If you want to rely on something that isn't guaranteed to stick around and not under YOUR control, then you deserve whatever you get!

If you do business with reliable partners they do NOT just disappear. And when a responsible partner goes out of business, they will give some lead time.

Meanwhile - cloud storage should be part of responsible data protection. Two drives at home and one away from home. Backups don't help much if a flood, fire or theft destroys them.

[Tarana]

Originally Posted by drjd

Thankfully enough, they have declared a refund to their existing premium members. Google translation of their notice (originally in Chinese) is given below:

Thankfully, they warned you in advance. There have been a couple of cloud services in the US that just STOPPED, although one gave you to the end of the month to get your stuff downloaded.

[Josieb1]

Originally Posted by leebase

Start with the free version of Onedrive and see how you like it. For my needs, everything I used Dropbox for, I can use Onedrive for. I still have my free dropbox and some iOS apps that use it to sync. Haven't felt the need to see if I could move them over to one drive.

Dropbox syncs everything by default. OneDrive you have to set up a folder(s) to sync. Once I learned the difference, it was no problem. It's actually nice to be able to put stuff on OneDrive that does NOT sync to every other computer I have. You can probably do that with Dropbox too, but I never tried.

My kids LOVED me giving them "real Office" instead of insisting the free Open Office was "just the same" (it's not).

I like Office365 shared doc editing much more than google docs

Thank you for your advice.

[drjd]

Originally Posted by Tarana

Thankfully, they warned you in advance. There have been a couple of cloud services in the US that just STOPPED, although one gave you to the end of the month to get your stuff downloaded.

Yes, I agree with you. They have given a long enough (3 months) time period to download your data back along with the payment refund. And that is a fair and appreciable business policy indeed.